Codemasters abandons Archlord

Codemasters has decided to stop running free-to-play MMO Archlord, passing the game over to Webzen instead.

Codemasters has announced that it will no longer be involved with MMO Archlord and will not be renewing contracts to support the game in America or Europe. Codemasters will be shutting down servers for the free-to-play MMO on October 2nd.

That won't mark the end of the game though, as Korean publisher Webzen will be taking up the reins and bringing new servers back up on October 3rd - apparently with all the character data intact too, so you won't have to start all over again.

Archlord has had a somewhat turbulent history, having begun life as a fully fledged commercial MMORPG from Codemasters, but having been quickly turned into a free-to-play variant after lukewarm reviews and disappointing sales. Now, it's switching publishers in the west too. Oh dear.

Codemasters will continue to operate it's other two MMOs, Lord of the Rings Online and Dungeons and Dragons Online. Jumpgate Evolution from NetDevil is supposedly on the horizon too, but Eurogamer join us in speculating that the game may have been quietly canned - certainly nothing has been heard of the game since it was delayed in May.

Oh, and just to avoid confusion, Archlord is not the same as Codemaster's singleplayer fantasy series, Overlord. We know we're forever getting the two mixed up.

Have you tried Archlord, or any other free to play MMOs? Let us know your thoughts in the forums.

Geez, Codemasters dumped RF Online right when Archlord was being pushed by them. Seems both games come from Korean developers that they can't agree with. Those Korean developers must be divas or something lol